big oil

“We’re Going to Take Back the Oil”: Venezuela and the Risk of Corporate Capture of U.S. Foreign Policy

“We’re Going to Take Back the Oil”: Venezuela and the Risk of Corporate Capture of U.S. Foreign Policy

While there are many critiques that could be leveled against the Trump administration in light of Maduro’s arrest, this article questions whether corporate capture of the U.S. government may be driving Trump’s increasingly interventionist foreign policy. Before this month’s operation, Trump justified his administration’s action against Venezuela, including striking more than thirty boats in the Caribbean and threatening future attacks on land, by claiming he was targeting drug-trafficking networks. And in fact, Maduro was arraigned on drug-trafficking charges in federal court in New York. But in the immediate aftermath of Maduro’s arrest, Trump started to discuss Venezuelan oil with increasing frequency, leading us to wonder whether getting “wealth out of the ground” was a deciding factor in the operational decision-making.

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